


Alter Ego?

by djponyo



Category: Naruto
Genre: F/F, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-01
Updated: 2019-01-01
Packaged: 2019-10-01 19:08:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,534
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17249750
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/djponyo/pseuds/djponyo
Summary: Written for Naruto Year End Bash 2018! Prompt by validtitty: Sakura and Ino are best (and totally """platonic""") friends irl... little do they know theyire actually online dating through their anonymous internet/roleplaying/blogging psuedonyms. This is plainly obvious... to everyone except them.





	Alter Ego?

_“Sakura, I don’t understand why you won’t believe me! Your girl’s name is ‘Flower Shop Hottie’, Ino’s family literally runs a flower shop, and you say her main avatar looks just like her! What is there to get here?”_  
“Look Naruto, first of all, there are like a million blonde haired, blue eyed anime girls in this game. It’s kind of a common look. And how many florists do you think live around here?!? It feels like it’s summer all the time! Isn’t that good for growing stuff?” Sakura huffed angrily into her phone, tired from climbing the stairs up to her dorm room. “I gotta go, I’m home now and yes before you ask, I’m logging on to SS. I’ll see you tomorrow Naruto.”

_“Fine! Eventually you'll see what I mean and when you do, nothing's gonna stop me from laughing at you for the rest of my life. Just so you know. See you tomorrow, Sakura!”_

Sakura hung up the phone with a sigh and dropper her backpack on the ground next to her computer desk. She pulled out her laptop and quickly logged in, selected the familiar icon to her latest hobby: Shinobi Strikers (colloquially known as SS).

Shinobi Strikers was an open-world exploration MMO that divided players into factions based on locations in the world map: Fire, Wind, Earth, Lightning, and Rain. Players could form groups within these factions to go on missions and earn money, experience, and items. It wasn’t the most popular of games but Sakura liked it because it was unique and easy to play, a fun distraction from the stress of student life. The community in general was pretty nice, but she still felt reluctant to jump into a voice channel to talk and stuck mostly to the chat windows. Whatever internet safety that had been drilled into her in early childhood kept her from giving too much personal info to strangers on the internet, even if it was only the sound of her voice. Though she couldn't deny that it would be fun, and definitely easier than typing all the time.

And maybe there was one person who she would love to hear...For the past several months Sakura had been (flirtily) messaging another player called flowershop_hottie, or FHS as Sakura liked to call her (that username was way too embarrassing to admit that she had DMed her first). All Sakura really knew about FHS was that she was a girl around her age that also used this game to destress after classes. And that was all she really wanted to know for now. While FHS was a great player, and had a great sense of humor who always seems to liven up the sometimes drab and repetitive missions, Sakura was reluctant to move their relationship beyond that of online ‘friends’. FHS knew her only as PinkSlug_Punch, a new player who was always ready to log on and chat. And Sakura was fine with that! Really...  
Especially if she really was Ino. Sakura had a lot of doubt, she didn’t believe in coincidences and especially not one this crazy! Ino didn’t seem too much like the type to be into playing games...

Ino Yamanaka. The most beautiful bright and shining girl she’d ever seen. Sakura first noticed her in her biochem lecture sitting a few seats away. It was easy to just sit by her the next class, and strike up a conversation when they were eventually assigned a partner task. They actually had quite a bit in common, and quickly became friends. If Sakura didn't know better, it felt like they could have been friends their whole lives. Who was she kidding! Ino was funny and sweet and sometimes kind of a rude bitch and Sakura really wanted to glue their faces together.  
\--  
The next day, Sakura headed to the cafeteria to grab a quick lunch with Naruto (and maybe a little unfortunately, his boyfriend Sasuke, who Sakura tended to butt heads with). As she opened the big glass entrance door she caught sight of Ino heading out with her two childhood friends, Chouji and Shikamaru.  
“Hey Forehead,” she said with a wink. Maybe Sakura was delusional but she swore she could catch a hint of her shampoo from her long blonde ponytail as she passed by.  
\---  
“Sakura I don't get it, if you like her just tell her! It's really not that hard! You guys even have little nicknames for each other, you're practically dating already!” Naruto threw his arms up wildly, swinging his drink cup around as the liquid sloshed dangerously. Sasuke eyed it tiredly and scooted his tray to the left, out of range.

“Sakura, you know I don't really care about your drama but I would love for Naruto to yell about something else. Go confess your undying love to this girl so we can have another conversation topic, thanks.” He glanced up briefly to give her a pointed look before going back to stirring his soup with disinterest.  
“What a dear friend you are to me Sasuke, whatever would I do without you.” she glared at him and took a swipe at his foot under the table, and he dodged like he was expecting it. “Ok yes. I like Ino. A lot. But you both know I kind of have a thing going on with FSH-” 

“You mean the girl you've been gaming with who you refuse to call on the phone or send a picture of yourself too? How could you honestly think you have a ‘thing’ going? I feel like knowing what someone looks like is like...step one of a relationship.” Sasuke interrupted.

“Hey!! There's no guarantee that FSH is anything they say they are. So what if I'm being cautious!” she shot back, “and you wouldn’t know Sasuke, if Naruto hadn’t told you!” she finished, grumbling, crossing her arms.

“Hey, you know everything I know, Sasuke knows. You just gotta take that risk with me!” Naruto laughed, leaning back a bit in his chair. “And I dunno Sakura... your ‘Flower Shop Hottie’ could be the blonde girl that sits next to you in class for all you know!” Naruto grinned. Sasuke rolled his eyes put his hand in front of his mouth to stifle a laugh.

Sakura opened her mouth, ready to tell them both to fuck off when her phone buzzed loudly. She quickly swiped off the alarm and stood to get her tray and her jacket hurriedly into her hands.

“Do you really have to say the whole username out loud? It’s embarrassing!” she snapped. “I gotta head to class anyway, so you two will just have to wait until tomorrow to badger me again!”  
\---  
Sakura returned to her dorm later that night exhausted and ready to relax and log in to SS and have some fun as per usual with FSH. She logged in and quickly jumped in the shower while she waited for the weekly update patch to download. Toweling her hair dry, she clicked into her DMs to see a message from FSH waiting for her:

_Hey… I know you're not super into the idea, but I'm gonna ask one more time. We talk literally every day. Would it really be such a big deal to do a Skype call? I think you're smart enough to know I'm not a 40-year-old catfisher ;)_

Sakura groaned and dropped her towel on the floor. Today was the day she’d been dreading. Time to find out if FSH was the girl she said she was or some creepy old man. She took a breath and released it slowly from her nose. She thought back to what Naruto said earlier at lunch. So she didn’t want to tell Ino about FSH. But why? It really was silly for her to be so unsure of herself. It was just a video game, it’s not like they were that serious. You're an adult Sakura, it's time to be mature about this.” she muttered to herself.

So why did she want to shut her laptop and crawl into bed? Shrugging off her concerns, she raised her hands to the keyboard to type a response:

_...I do want to know who you are. I really enjoyed the past few months we’ve played together, you know that. I do consider you as someone special to me. I just don't want to put trust you and be disappointed. You understand that, right?_

FSH's response came immediately.

_Why don’t you just call me and find out._

Not a minute later another message popped up with her Skype info. Sakura quickly added her and pressed the video call button, butterflies in her stomach and her heart beating in her throat.  
Sakura didn’t know if she would ever be able to describe what she felt when the call when through and she saw FSH for the first time. Shock, confusion, joy, and fear. Lots of that.  
The girl on the other side of the screen...was THE Ino Yamanaka!  
Ino’s eyes went huge and her mouth fell open. Sakura almost wanted to laugh at the shocked look on her face, though it was probably so much lie her own.

“Sakura… YOU’RE MY ONLINE GIRLFRIEND????”

**Author's Note:**

> First I wanna say this prompt was great! it was really challenging to write them as friends with a secret they won't share with each other that was so mild like playing games lol
> 
> Their usernames are silly but I couldn't come up with anything that wasn't making it too obvious who they were while still making it unique to them. So I asked my best friend for help and she gave me these and it was so funny I laughed so hard lol  
> Sakuras a nerd so she set an alarm to not be late for class  
> There was a lot more I wanted to do with this but I got busy and ran out of time and I wanted to post on the day of! Later I'm gonna clean this up and make it like super nice :’)


End file.
